Friday, February 17, 2017

The Trump Cabinet Confirmation Farce Proceeds Apace


Scott Pruitt, longtime adversary of EPA, confirmed to lead the agency

By Brady Dennis February 17 at 2:20 PM

Scott Pruitt, who as Oklahoma’s attorney general spent years suing the Environmental Protection Agency over its efforts to regulate various forms of pollution, was confirmed Friday as the agency’s next administrator.

Pruitt cleared the Senate by a vote of 52-46, winning support from two Democrats, Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota. Only one Republican, Susan Collins of Maine, voted against him, saying he had “fundamentally different” views than she about the EPA’s role.

The vote came after Democrats held the Senate floor for hours overnight and through the morning to criticize Pruitt as a pawn of the fossil-fuel industry and to push for a last-minute delay of his confirmation. Part of their argument was an Oklahoma judge’s ruling late Thursday that Pruitt’s office must turn over thousands of emails related to his communication with oil, gas and coal companies. The judge set a Tuesday deadline for the release of the emails, which a nonprofit group had been seeking for more than two years.

Republicans pressed forward with the afternoon vote, saying Pruitt had been thoroughly vetted in recent months and calling on Democrats to end what Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) called “a historic level of obstruction” in holding up Trump administration nominees.

Pruitt’s confirmation marked a serious defeat for environmental advocacy groups, which wrote letters, waged a furious social media campaign, lobbied members of Congress, paid for television ads and sponsored a series of public protests to keep the Oklahoman from taking the reins of EPA.

“Scott Pruitt as administrator of the EPA likely means a full-scale assault on the protections that Americans have enjoyed for clean air, clean water and a healthy climate,” Michael Brune, executive director of the Sierra Club, said in an interview. “For environmental groups, it means we’re in for the fight of our lives for the next four years.”

Pruitt has sued the EPA more than a dozen times during the Obama administration, challenging the agency’s authority to regulate toxic mercury pollution, smog, carbon emissions from power plants and the quality of wetlands and other waters. In Oklahoma, he dismantled a specialized environmental protection unit that had existed under his Democratic predecessor and established a “federalism unit” to combat what he called “unwarranted regulation and systematic overreach” by Washington.
...
Remember, Sixty-three million of our neighbors voted for this.

And seven million of our neighbors chose to tantrum-piss away their votes rather than stand against this.

We should really find just the right way to thank them.

7 comments:

jim said...

Back long before my time, the usual gift was one white feather.

Perhaps a more apt token of appreciation in this case would be a wooden nickel.

Ok said...

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) called “a historic level of obstruction” in holding up Trump administration nominees.

Geez, McChinless sure has a pair on him, don't he? 😩

trgahan said...

and hundreds of internet commenters, a several "progressive" bloggers, and Susan Sarandon who don't read beyond the headline will scream that Pruitt's confirmation is further proof that corporatist, sell out, Clintonian Democrats are the REAL problem!

Because like all the previous Trump confirmations this is on paragraph three; therefore never happened:

"The vote came after Democrats held the Senate floor for hours overnight and through the morning to criticize Pruitt as a pawn of the fossil-fuel industry and to push for a last-minute delay of his confirmation."

Kevin Holsinger said...

Good evening, Mr. Glass.

"We should really find just the right way to thank them."

I'm thinking of using the term MAGAts for them.

Be seeing you.

Jimbo said...

And let's be clear, the "federalist" solution of people like Pruitt, Price, Mnuchin and the GOP Congress won't mean that pollution, toxins and other waste, loss of health insurance, financial fraud and jacked up fees will ruin the lives of most people in the blue states; that will be the fate of the red states including the innocent but also very much the people in those very states who so believe that Mr. Mystico Trump will save them from the misery of their lives. Karma is a bitch people and Trump/Pence is going to rain down karma on the Trumpsters.

Neo Tuxedo said...

Trump/Pence is going to rain down karma on the Trumpsters.

This. There is nothing we can do to them that is worse than what they voted to do, or didn't vote against doing, to themselves. At least, until and unless we somehow acquire the un-, sub- or super-natural ability to make them see the causal connection between their actions (letting the Perfect[ly Awful] be the enemy of the Good) and the consequences of those actions (Lord Dampnut and his Bến Tre cabinet).

dinthebeast said...

MAGAts indeed.

-Doug in Oakland